From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, a stunningly ambitious and beautiful novel about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II. Marie Laure lives with her father in Paris within... show more

From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, a stunningly ambitious and beautiful novel about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

Marie Laure lives with her father in Paris within walking distance of the Museum of Natural History where he works as the master of the locks (there are thousands of locks in the museum). When she is six, she goes blind, and her father builds her a model of their neighborhood, every house, every manhole, so she can memorize it with her fingers and navigate the real streets with her feet and cane. When the Germans occupy Paris, father and daughter flee to Saint-Malo on the Brittany coast, where Marie-Laure's agoraphobic great uncle lives in a tall, narrow house by the sea wall.

In another world in Germany, an orphan boy, Werner, grows up with his younger sister, Jutta, both enchanted by a crude radio Werner finds. He becomes a master at building and fixing radios, a talent that wins him a place at an elite and brutal military academy and, ultimately, makes him a highly specialized tracker of the Resistance. Werner travels through the heart of Hitler Youth to the far-flung outskirts of Russia, and finally into Saint-Malo, where his path converges with Marie-Laure.

Doerr's gorgeous combination of soaring imagination with observation is electric. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another. Ten years in the writing, All the Light We Cannot See is his most ambitious and dazzling work.

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I'll start by saying that All the Light We Cannot See is beautifully written. I also loved the characters and the complexity each one brought. This extended beyond the main characters. I enjoyed seeing the effects of WWII from both sides. We had Marie-Laure, a blind Parisian girl, who loses her home...

I really did enjoy this. But I have read and listened to a lot of world war II books and I think this is one of those that will not be as memorable. I enjoyed Code Name Verity and The Nightingale much more. I do see why people really enjoy All the Light We Cannot See, its a great book to discuss and...

Why is it so hard to review books I love? I’ve been thinking about this novel for days, and I still have no words. This might be my new favorite read of 2016. I don’t know what to say to make you read it. “It's embarrassingly plain how inadequate language is.” – All the Light We Cannot See Thi...

One of my kids recommended this book to me and said it made her cry. I wasn't moved to tears, but I certainly felt a lot tension, and I can't imagine what it would be like to live under such stress. This is a good read with solid intensity.

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